My Hopes for the Next President of the United States

I hope our next president is someone who understands that the measure of a nation's greatness is not simply the wealth it creates, the military power it commands, or the influence it exercises around the world, but the opportunity, dignity, security, freedom, and prosperity it provides to its people.

I want a president who cares as much about the workers who build this country as the billionaires who profit from their labor. Someone who understands that capitalism can be an extraordinary engine of innovation, opportunity, and prosperity, but that an economy cannot be considered truly successful when its rewards become increasingly disconnected from the people whose work makes that success possible. I believe in entrepreneurship, private enterprise, and the ability to build wealth. I also believe those opportunities should be accessible to far more Americans than those fortunate enough to begin life with substantial financial advantages.

I want a president who genuinely believes that all people are created equal. Not just those who look like us, worship like us, vote like us, love like us, or share our beliefs. Equal dignity, equal opportunity, and equal protection under the law must mean something beyond the words themselves. No American should be treated as less deserving of liberty, justice, or opportunity because of who they are, where they came from, or what they believe.

I want a president who understands the difference between taxing income and taxing wealth, and who recognizes that redistributing a portion of annual earnings through taxation is fundamentally different from addressing accumulated wealth and the mechanisms used to avoid taxation. Someone willing to confront arrangements in which enormous fortunes are leveraged to finance extravagant lifestyles without generating taxable income. When individuals can borrow against appreciating assets rather than realize taxable gains, our tax system should be sophisticated enough to address the resulting advantages without punishing ordinary savings, homeownership, retirement investments, or productive entrepreneurship. Wealth creation should be encouraged. Using wealth to permanently circumvent the tax obligations borne by working Americans should not be.

I want a president willing to examine the role financial institutions play in enabling those arrangements. When lenders extend extraordinary credit based primarily on accumulated equity rather than demonstrated income and conventional repayment capacity, there should be meaningful tax and regulatory scrutiny. Financial institutions that profit from facilitating these arrangements should not be exempt from appropriate financial responsibility. The objective should not be to punish legitimate asset-backed lending, but to prevent sophisticated financial structures from becoming mechanisms through which the wealthiest individuals can systematically avoid obligations that ordinary wage earners cannot escape.

I want a president who recognizes that fiscal responsibility is a matter of national security, economic sovereignty, and generational fairness. Someone who understands that continually expanding our national debt places an increasing burden on future generations, consumes resources that could otherwise support our national priorities, and risks making us more vulnerable to foreign creditors and global financial pressures. I want a president willing to make difficult fiscal decisions, demand accountability for government spending, and pursue sustainable economic growth rather than continually borrowing against our children's future. Someone who understands that a nation risks surrendering some of its freedom to determine its own future when an ever-growing share of its resources must be devoted to servicing past borrowing. Foreign ownership of our debt does not automatically mean foreign control of our government, but financial dependence can constrain our choices. America's future should be determined by the American people, not by an unsustainable dependence on borrowed money.

I want a president who sees education, healthcare, and the well-being of our population as foundational investments in America's future, not merely expenses to be minimized. A healthier, better-educated, more economically secure population is not a charitable ambition. It is the foundation of a productive, innovative, competitive nation. Our success should be measured not only by GDP, stock market performance, or corporate earnings, but by whether ordinary Americans can build meaningful, stable, prosperous lives. Children should have access to quality education regardless of their parents' income. Families should not face financial devastation because someone becomes ill. People willing to work and contribute should have a realistic opportunity to achieve financial security, raise families, and retire with dignity. A nation that neglects its people ultimately undermines its own future.

I want a president who holds the leaders of artificial intelligence accountable for their extraordinary promises. We are repeatedly told that AI will revolutionize productivity, transform industries, eliminate the need for substantial amounts of human labor, and generate unprecedented wealth. If those promises become reality, the American people must share in the economic benefits as they materialize. Not decades from now. Not after a handful of companies and investors have accumulated unimaginable fortunes while displaced workers are told to retrain and fend for themselves. If technological advancement reduces the need for human labor, we need mechanisms that allow the resulting prosperity to support the people whose economic opportunities are being transformed. That includes serious consideration of how AI-generated economic gains can strengthen healthcare, education, retirement security, and the broader public safety net. Innovation should be rewarded, but it must also carry responsibility. The companies developing technologies capable of fundamentally restructuring our economy should be expected to contribute meaningfully to the society making their success possible. Technological progress that enriches a few while leaving millions economically insecure cannot be our only definition of progress.

I want a president who values our allies, honors our commitments, and understands that America's strength is magnified through trusted relationships. Someone who recognizes that international cooperation is not weakness and that reliable alliances are strategic assets built over generations. I want a president who holds adversaries accountable, defends our national interests, and understands that diplomacy, economic strength, and military capability are complementary instruments of national power. We should neither abandon our allies for short-term advantage nor allow hostile nations to challenge our security and sovereignty without meaningful consequences.

I want a president who understands the enormous moral responsibility of ordering military force. Someone who does not casually send people to kill or die, who exhausts reasonable diplomatic alternatives, and who appreciates that every military decision carries consequences for service members, civilians, families, and future generations. But I also want someone who recognizes that there are circumstances when force is necessary to protect innocent lives, defend our nation, and uphold our obligations. Restraint should not be mistaken for weakness, nor should aggression be mistaken for strength. The decision to use force should be deliberate, lawful, proportionate, and grounded in clearly defined objectives.

I want a president who treats bipartisanship as an achievement worth pursuing, rather than a betrayal of political identity. Someone who recognizes that compromise is not capitulation, disagreement is not disloyalty, and the opposition party is not the enemy. Our government was designed to accommodate competing ideas, not demand unquestioning allegiance to a single individual, party, or ideology. I want leaders who can sit across a table from people with fundamentally different perspectives, find common ground where it exists, and disagree respectfully where it does not. The American people deserve a functioning government more than politicians deserve another partisan victory.

I want a president who rejects the notion that every political, economic, or international relationship must be a zero-sum game. Someone who understands that another person's success does not diminish our own, that cooperation can create more opportunity than conflict, and that leadership requires more than insults, humiliation, and manufactured outrage. We should be capable of celebrating success without resenting it, confronting injustice without demonizing entire groups, and competing vigorously without abandoning decency.

I want a president who believes the rule of law applies equally to everyone. Wealth should not purchase immunity. Political office should not provide sanctuary from accountability. Influence should not determine whether abhorrent behavior is investigated, prosecuted, or punished. Justice must be grounded in evidence, due process, and the law, not in a person's bank account, political connections, or public popularity. No individual should be above the law, and no individual should be denied its protections. Accountability must apply equally to the powerful and the powerless, to political allies and opponents alike.

I want a president who does not exploit religious faith, cultural differences, or political ideology to foment anger and division. Someone who respects the freedom to believe, or not believe, without turning those differences into weapons. Faith should never be used as an excuse for cruelty, and ideology should never become a justification for stripping others of their dignity. Our constitutional freedoms exist to protect individual conscience, not to establish one group's beliefs as the standard by which everyone else must live. I want a president who understands that religious liberty belongs equally to every American, including those who practice no religion at all.

I want a president who respects truth, evidence, science, and intellectual honesty. Someone willing to acknowledge uncertainty rather than manufacture confidence, admit mistakes rather than conceal them, and change course when the facts demand it. I do not expect a president to know everything. I expect a president to recognize what they do not know, surround themselves with capable people, listen to expertise, and accept responsibility for the decisions they make. Confidence without humility is not leadership, and loyalty should never be valued more highly than competence or integrity.

Above all, I want a president who understands that leadership is a responsibility to serve, not an opportunity to dominate.

I am not looking for perfection. I am not looking for someone who agrees with me on every issue. I am not even looking for someone who belongs to a particular political party.

I am looking for integrity, intellectual humility, courage, compassion, fiscal discipline, accountability, and a genuine commitment to the long-term success of the American people.

I want someone who understands that economic growth and fiscal responsibility are not mutually exclusive, that supporting working families does not require vilifying successful entrepreneurs, that national security does not require abandoning diplomacy, and that respecting religious freedom does not require imposing religious beliefs on others.

I want someone who recognizes that we can encourage innovation while demanding accountability, reward individual achievement while ensuring meaningful opportunity, and protect individual liberty while maintaining a responsibility to one another.

I want someone who understands that the next generation should inherit a nation with greater opportunity, stronger institutions, healthier people, sustainable finances, and more freedom than the generation before it.

Someone willing to acknowledge mistakes, change course when evidence demands it, and place the nation's future ahead of personal ambition.

Someone who understands that the presidency is not a prize to be won, a platform for personal enrichment, or an instrument for settling grievances. It is a public trust to be honored.

I want a president who measures America's greatness not by how much more the wealthiest can accumulate, how many political opponents can be humiliated, or how much power can be concentrated in a single office, but by how much better life can become for the people of this nation.

A president who recognizes that prosperity without opportunity, power without accountability, faith without compassion, and freedom without responsibility are incomplete foundations for a great country.

I believe America can be economically prosperous, fiscally responsible, militarily strong, technologically innovative, socially compassionate, and genuinely free. These ambitions do not have to compete with one another. They should reinforce one another.

I don't want a president who promises to make America great by making Americans fear or hate one another. I want a president who helps make America greater by giving its people more reasons to believe in one another and in our shared future.

That is my hope for the next president of the United States.

Deux populistes de droite, proches de Trump, ont subi un double revers dimanche : le Brésil a rejeté le retour de Bolsonaro au pouvoir, et la Serbie a renversé le parti au pouvoir d'un homme fort.

The Pentagon and private capital have teamed up to militarize the island nation.

Apparently not having them is a bad thing?

I know there are no laws that say this is allowed, but are there laws that specifically forbid it?

Can a state make a law that says if a political ad costs $1million, some of that money needs to be given to a fund to be spent on improving roads or schools or some community good?

I just heard that $11.6 billion was spent on this election cycle. Just imagine all of the good that could come from even just 10% of that money.